The Hamburglar: a friend of Ronald McDonald?
Photograph: McDonalds/AP

McDonald’s, the company that for 70 years has kept us hungry for more, may have found a new way to unlock consumers’ hearts.

The $28bn burger chain is out to pilfer your pennies and wheedle your wad with an artful dodger too charming to refuse. At least that seems to be the idea, with the introduction this week of a brand new figure in the corporation’s timelessly lovable good-time gang of fast-food friends.

Ladies and gentlemen: meet the reinvented Hamburglar.

Whoops! Did his red leather glove swipe the snack you’d planned to call lunch? Shhhh … don’t tell the cafeteria cops. He’s heisted before but he can’t be caught.

McDonald’s reinvention of the Hamburglar was seemingly meant as a play for refreshed cultural relevance, but deeply mixed reactions to the new beef thief raise the prospect that the corporation has miscalculated.

Hamburglar is stealing headlines for a look that has diners used to the cartoonish approachability of his forebear wondering what to make of the man in the trenchcoat, fedora and Velcro shoes. His ample dimples undisguised by a five-o’clock shadow Sonny Crockett could envy. His slate-gray eyes illegible behind a Lone Ranger mask.

Was it a mistake to bring him to life? Should the Hamburglar have remained a goofy animation? McDonald’s has plenty of motivation to experiment these days, having seen same-store sales in the United States drop 4% in February and 1.7% worldwide. The going has been especially difficult in Asia, where the chain has had multiple food safety scares.

The problem in the United States seems plain: the advent of artisanal everything is working against a company that proudly advertises billions and billions served. Fancy diners are gravitating to Shake Shake or Chipotle. Fast-food lovers deciding strictly on budget might opt for leaner Burger King. McDonald’s seems to sit at an emptying table in the middle.

The fashion for small-batch sales could explain a certain edgy appeal some detect in the new burglar. That black trenchcoat would walk you handsomely down Bedford Avenue any night of the week. The red high-tops look suspiciously like Yeezy Boosts. The beard, the brimmed lid – this Hamburglar is making an undeniable play at hipster.

Other people think he’s just unspeakably creepy. But McDonald’s needn’t fret: people have said that about Ronald McDonald for years, and they’re definitely wrong.